Fresh Hot Stuff

Oct 6, 2006 @ 3:10 pm

Andy Skelton

That title isn’t meant to be vague. It refers to the Hot Posts and Hot Blogs lists on the front page. I think we’re not alone in getting a little tired of seeing the same items showing up for hours or days at a time. It was time to shake things up. The rankings are still in order but now they vary with every page load.

We’re now showing a random, top-heavy sample of the top posts and blogs. That is, we display more items from rankings 1-10 than 11-20 and so on. Rank 1 is always shown in the top spot. The next spot is a random selection from ranks 2-3. The next one is from 4-6, then 7-10. Thus even the 50th most popular post can be on the home page about one tenth of the time.

The odds that the page will show the same 10-item list are something like 3,628,800:1 against. The probability distribution is shown here:

I could get even more technical, explaining how we make the lists when there are not enough ranked items, but the odds that you’ll be interested are 14,285:1 against.

I hope this makes the front page more interesting for regular visitors. The complete rankings are still available at BOTD, updated hourly and archived nightly.

Email Newsletter

Missing out on the latest WordPress.com developments? Enter your email below to receive future announcements direct to your inbox. An email confirmation will be sent before you will start receiving notifications - please check your spam folder if you don't receive this.

An interesting approach from a mathematically inclined mind to be sure. However as I’m of a more artistic bent I’ll have to read it over at least a couple more times to comprehend it. At this point what I think I understand is randomness has been introduced – kewl.;)

What a fun way to keep the top list interesting and fresh. Great use of math and probabilities — still rewards the best posts, but also provides a bit of equity and opportunity for others. Fantastic idea.

not sure if it really matters anyhow or if someone is waiting for advertising when those doors open. will see but love the new pic feature just back from my honeymoon and love to enlarge the pics. thanks for that.

I’ve only been with WP for a really short period of time but yes, I’d noticed the repetition on the front page.
However, it certainly wasn’t all bad.
Yesterday, for the first time, I stuck my (ever increasing) nose into the Mary Kay Blog (a topic of which I normally have absolutely zero interest in and found a really interesting series of comments / arguments being bantered about.
Nonetheless, minus that little treasure of a moment, a change would be lovely!
Thank you ever so much.

why dont u guys give at least one blog or post which was never readd.. the idea is kinda foolish, but top post anyway are getting plenty of readers, and that keeps them motivated to write ..

but there are lot ppl who dont get reader or any reponse and slowly self pushed motivation dies one day. i know we do not blog to get reader, but then how long one would like to be in isolation.. we need co, we need to form grp of like minded ppl. and blogs will help to do that

i just think you need to be less draconian with your profanity and bad words filter. mine is a political and activist blog and we discuss child-pornography, rape, genocide, and those kind of things often, and its unfair that even though i have numerous posts that pull in about 5000 hits over three days i still can’t make any of these lists. i think your monitoring should by blog to blog not post to post.

some of my posts pull in 5000 to 10,000 hits over three days and i still can’t find a way onto these lists. that reveals that these lists are not at all comprehensive or accurate. you need to find a better filter, please.

I agree with AVUEE “Why not focus on the content instead of a number? What about reviewing a blog once or twice a week that doesn’t focus on the number of hits it received.” and i add why not review blogs that allways have readers, not some day yes, other day not